To change my 7 year old’s school?

[ThornAmongstRoses]

AIBU to consider taking my 7 year out of his school and placing him in another purely because I think the other school is a better one for him?

Me and my husband have had some concerns about our son’s current school and despite raising them twice and being given reassurances by his teacher and HOY, nothing has changed.

There is another school nearby (though not as convenient as his current school) which has a fantastic reputation, I know there’s space in his year group if we were to transfer him, but the thought of taking him away from his friends is hard to make peace with.

Has anyone else moved their child in similar circumstances and it turned out ok?

Me and my husband just don’t know what to do for the best.

Does your hisband teach at a private school because I think that is where the issue between his expectations and the reality may well occur.

But yes lockdown is causing quite a lot of this as well - there is far less movement far less ability to move around the classroom etc.

I will have another chat to my DH about it tomorrow, see if he can take the more rational approach I.e taking into account the difficulties that Covid has caused, and we should give the school/teacher the benefit of the doubt and re-assess in 6 months or so.

Does he teach at a Private school OP?

‘’My husband would love to send our son to private school but we just couldn’t afford it.’’

I think state funded schools always have improving attainment for the struggling pupils as a priority over getting the most out of the brightest children.
I don’t know much about the English system, but if he’s that clever, would it be possible to get him moved up a year in his state school? Or get into a private school on a scholarship?

It’s not Private, there are no fees, but the school only caters for a certain group of people.

I don’t want to say too much as it may be outing (can’t believe I’ve said, I hate it when people say that) but the establishment he teaches in is for a niche market. It’s kind of religion based and no outsiders are allowed.

I think that this is not a problem with the school necessarily but with the state system full stop. Teachers’ efforts, resources, time are often understandably used to get the middle ability kids to stay ‘up’ and the strugglers to scrape through. The kids who are above and doing fine aren’t going to pull Ofsted averages down.

If you have solid evidence that the teachers in the other school provide better stretch for higher ability kids, then I’d switch, but only if you can be sure of this. Otherwise, carry on doing lots outside school to support his interests and keep up proper conversations with the school about ways he can be stretched. If he’s allowed independent reading, then is he allowed a lined book to do his own project writing in?

Good luck

I have a similar issue with my y2 child and I agree it's tricky, but it is possible to differentiate work and the school could at least be reassuring you that this is done? Dd is off the chart for maths and reading books her 9yo brother wouldn't cope with. But lockdown has revealed that her executive functioning leaves a lot to be desired and getting her to actually complete a task is the problem, not whether she knows the required information.

I can guess what type of school your dh works in and I'd assume they have much smaller classes? Makes a huge difference in my experience, and for that reason I agree that state education sadly often fails the kids either side of average. I worry about dd getting turned off learning by being bored too.

It does sound like you've conveyed your concerns many times... I'd be considering my options I think.

To clarify, my dc have been at school throughout so it's the smaller classes which have revealed her issues. And helped both my dc.

Then I think he needs to look at it not from the point of view of what he is able to do in his school but much more objectively at the state system

I imagine he has much smaller class sizes and a different relationship with the pupils so what he is able to achieve is different - it probably should be but that is the educational system

My 7 yo son is fed up with school at the moment, he says it's boring and repetitive and he wished he could stay home and get the work done in 10 mins so he can watch TV etc!
I'm hoping things will settle back down soon

A friend of mine who has been able to properly home school her child for the lockdown year, says she now wishes she hadn't.
He's back at school now and all they're doing is going over all the things he did at home with his mum last year, as most hadn't. He's bored, and complacent now. Was none of these things before lockdown.

Tricky - just because a school has a fantastic reputation doesn’t mean it will necessarily be better for your son.
I agree with the pp that said there is a HUGE difference in ability in a classroom of 7 year olds. Your son could be just as bored at the next school.
Do you know anything about his teacher for next year? A teacher can make a massive difference. My DD has an excellent teacher this year who seems to be able to manage the different ability levels brilliantly. The top students are being challenged. However, DDs teacher last year wasn’t able to manage this nearly as well. She definitely focussed on the middle/bottom of the class and let the top ones get bored. It’s inevitable that some teachers will suit your son more than others. So I’d check before moving.
How strong are your son’s friendships at school? This is so important - it would be a shame to move him to a slightly more challenging environment only for him to be miserable socially. So hard to make a judgement on this one. I know one of my DCs would be devastated if I told her she was leaving her friends, and my other one would be less bothered.
Good luck with your decision.

Its a tough one. I have a bright yr 1, I am a secondary teacher and can see she is bright in some subjects, mainly reading and maths.

During lockdown they haven't been in so I have seen how well she can work.

However I do understand the teacher/(s) has had a really tough time over the past year, during lockdown I have had to aim for the middle, I am not there to push my students on. When I set different work and tell them how to access level appropriate I get complaints from parents from the less able as I am setting too much however many times I say just work for an hour!

We did have some extra maths work set, and last week she has been set challenges, however I can also see the benefit in her doing the basics even if she does find it easy as it is the building blocks for more complex maths.

The way I have addressed it is to challenge them at home, we have loads of books, (would normally have been to the library, now I need to start my own!) especially non fiction, I am doing spelling tests which they don't do in class, I am playing maths games, we used a dictionary lots during her English lesson a skill that she didn't know.

I was frustrated back in September as there was a lot of recapping of stuff I had covered in reception, but then I know lots of friends have done very little.

With the homework change it up - challenge him give him a time limit, get him to list number facts about each sum. I agree with a PP your attitude towards the homework will influence his attitude.

I am sure as a teacher your DH can source ideas.

We did this and it has been the best move possible. I got regrets a few months in about friendships etc but she now has new closer friends. She’s doing much much better and I have zero concerns or in fact anything I would change. She’s been there two years now (although one has been through covid)

It would have been very wrong of them to push him further when many of his classmates were at home with no chance or choice.

Erm, no it wouldn’t! All children are supposed to be challenged at their own level. Yes, morally, we should help those with the least skills, but that doesn’t mean the high achievers sitting doing nothing for most of the day.

@Lettuceforlunch
I think you've misunderstood. I was specifically referring to lockdown. Our school were very clear that those in school during lockdown would be getting exactly the same teaching as those who were at home. Ie half an hour zoom lesson, and then work to do ok their own.

Enrol him at Mensa, and work towards enrolling him in a prep school if you can afford it. Wasting his talents at such a young age may mean he becomes indifferent to learning.

It does sound to me like he is being failed by his school tbh. One of the reasons that teaching is often said in here to be so hard, is the need to differentiate work for different children, and so if that is part of the job, then why isn't it happening for your son?

And yes pandemic etc, but we are a year into this, and that's a considerable proportion of a child's schooling.

When he was in Year 1 it wasn’t a problem at all, his teacher was so proactive and encouraging him to try the harder work and working him to his strengths....but this year that’s just stopped.

His teacher this year is very young though, she started 18 months ago as a newly qualified teacher I imagine, and she’s absolutely lovey (not bothered about the fact she’s young/new etc) but I do wonder if it’s her inexperience that be adding to the issue. Not that I blame her seeing as such a short time into her career she’s been hit with the Pandemic and having to navigate her way through this as well as find her way as a newly qualified teacher.

I’ve said this to my husband too....it’s alright him getting annoyed and saying what she ‘should’ be doing in terms of reaching out to the higher ability children to ensure they are also pushed, but he’s talking from 20 years experience as a teacher, which is very different to the situation our son’s teacher is in.

Anyhow, I’m going to talk to him about it tonight, give him the MN verdict and suggest we just hold back on our judgement (for want of a better word) and see how things are when he goes into Year 3.

Unfortunately this may be a problem that you have in every school - particularly if he is able at maths. Unfortunately the national curriculum is very badly designed for able mathematicians.

Basically a child cannot do work other than that for their own year. So all the school can do is set basically the same questions over and over again - maybe with bigger numbers.

So - for example - Dd in year 6 is learning addition of fractions. So the rest of the class is puzzling over 2/5 + 3/7. So they can set Dd 29/47 + 46/59 but they can’t move her onto multiplication or division of fractions. (And as she puts it “once you work out the method mummy it is just basic arithmetic anyway”.)

So you may face a similar problem in the next school anyway. (Although I do think there should be some level of “challenge” set for your ds as it sounds like he is just doing 2/5 + 3/7.)

Things that have helped with my two:-

1. Big school - they are in a year group of 90 so it means that the gap between them and the “next most able” is smaller and also that there are a number who are “outliers” and so the three teachers between them set one lot of extension work for them all.
2. “Naice” school - lots of sharp elbowed middle class parents pushing their poor little Annabelle to keep up with my two and so again stopping them from being an outlier.
3. Ds has had an easier run of it than Dd as he is younger and having had Dd the teachers are already “expecting” him when he turns up.

Both kids have spent a reasonably large part of their school life reading and helping others though. I tend to leave alone unless they are unhappy.

Yes I agree with maths - and with the greatest respect to primary school teachers most do not have maths as particular skill set either. DD had one amazing maths teacher at Primary school. Therefore actually finding stuff to challenge her that they could teach her was difficult. The nature of Primary is to be a jack of all trades and a master of none.

They also have gaps in their knowledge as well as to where everyone is - I think you are overestimating how normal school has been over the past year and the ability to do stuff and how much they are trying to get everyone back on track from two quite brutal lockdowns. And that includes I think the processes of socialising then back, getting them back into routines etc and testing them again to see where they are. Those tests I imagine will happen this half term to properly get where everyone is and implement next term.

She found helping others and figuring out her own maths problems the way forward. She is loving it now she is in Year 7 and her teacher goes all the way up to teaching A Level because he can. High School is a completely different ball game.

Is he happy though - there is a lot about your husband and his negativity perhaps impacting your son. But does he like it. As I have said DDs friends very much made her primary school experience even if the work bored her sometimes

My son loves his school and his friends which is why I’m more reluctant than my DH.

However, a few posters have passed comments that my son’s attitude to learning will follow the attitude that me and my DH have (in relation to us not making him doing his homework because it’s so easy for him and pointless) so if we leave him where he is and tell him that it doesn’t matter if he’s bored, it doesn’t matter that he’s not stimulated to improve and school is just an easy ride, well that’s not a good attitude to instil into him either is it?

I moved my 7yo last year during lockdown as the school he was at had been a mess for a while and their lockdown efforts were shameful.

He started on a keyworker place and that eased him in well.

Best thing I could've done. He's settled now and I'm so much happier with their approach:

Go for itS

If he loves it I would certainly leave it for now

With something like

Which of these nouns goes bark?

A) a boy
B) a car
C) a dog
D) a house.

You can go through with him something further - what different groups make up nouns - here you can see living creatures and objects what else are they. They are common nouns and concrete nouns.
Could you make one a collective noun could you turn another into a proper noun.

What is bark - what would be something you could say using the same for the others. Teach him the skills to look at the work he is given and take it that next level himself

Can your dh source a couple of work books of maths and english extension work? Send them in for him to do in class when he has finished the set work?